Our View: Finish campaign season with your vote in election

Is it just us or is this the longest campaign season in history? The raucous City Council election behavior that started in early spring and picked up steam in the divisive infighting of the primary elections continued into the most expensive and perhaps bitterly fought presidential race in recent memory.

We have been polled, re-polled, told we are socialists or patriots, subjected to some of the finest fiction ever seen on television, and at the end of the day we have the same choice we always have. Performance versus promise.

As worn out as we all might be by this marathon of vitriol, there is one important task left to complete. The central privilege of the Republic is the right and responsibility to vote. Many of us have voted already with absentee ballots. By most accounts this could be the most important presidential election in decades. Rarely have we had such a clear and distinct choice between two candidates and the direction our country will take.

Unemployment, underemployment and the tenuousness of our own employment affects all Americans. Larger government or smaller government will touch everyone with the role that government plays in our lives. The future complexion of the Supreme Court, moving to the left or moving to the right, may someday be seen by historians as the most significant impact of all. America’s place and role on the world stage will most certainly be shaped by this election. How the next administration deals with budget deficits and the national debt will have dramatic effect on the quality of life for our children and grandchildren. This is not an election to sit out.